Chris Gayle and the question marks over non-white civilization

Jul 23, 2014 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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If Chris Gayle had done in the United States what he did in Antigua last week, it is possible that even with an apology his credibility would have been lacerated. The trouble with Gayle is that he has added fuel to the fire inside the mind of VS Naipaul, who believes that the Caribbean will never be a formation of civilized substance.

The Caribbean Premier League (CPL) leadership behaved no different from Gayle in response to the accusation that Gayle did a terrible thing. Gayle did commit an unspeakable sin, and the men in the CPL hierarchy were not soulful enough (maybe one should say civilized enough) to see that Gayle had stumbled badly. They defended Gayle.

Then came another manifestation of the inherent problems with non-white civilization. The woman herself that Gayle insulted accepted her humiliation, and was proud to wear her slave badge on her sleeve in a conspicuous way.

There was another manifestation of the congenital fault-lines in non-white civilization. The Caribbean people remained silent on what Gayle did and cheered him on as if they were in love with their slave masters.

The final episode of this sad drama was that the slave woman was retained by her employer who turned a blind eye to her sickening servility. Before we turn to the question marks over non-white civilization, let’s look at Gayle himself (he knows which limb to jump pon – Gayle would not have done that in the UK).

Even with the United States not being a cricketing nation, Chris Gayle will be the first name to come out of the mouth of American citizens if you ask them to name a cricketer who is a superstar. Mr. Gayle is one of the most recognizable faces in world sports. A billion people in India adore him more than Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, and other global sporting icons.

The cult of Chris Gayle in Jamaica is exceeded only by the obsession with Usain Bolt. In the rest of the Caribbean, Chris Gayle is one of the geniuses that cricket gave birth to. While representing Jamaica at a formal, professional press conference, a female journalist asked Gayle how the pitch felt so far, in terms of the training (and) the weather. Gayle’s response was that he had not touched the journalist’s pitch yet, so he didn’t know how it feels.

Take note – this was an internationally known sporting icon speaking at a formal press conference. It was sexist. It was gender-biased, and had the scent of profanity. But take note again – this was not Gayle speaking in a telephone conversation. This was not a Facebook moment. This was Gayle speaking on behalf of Jamaica and the Caribbean Premier League.

Life is interesting. Days after Gayle embarrassed the people of the Third World came a shocker. One of the most celebrated novelists in the world; a Booker Prize Winner and a New York Times best seller, Arundhati Roy, called on India to remove all institutions bearing the name, Mahatma Gandhi, and to reassess Gandhi. She wrote that Gandhi cannot be a revered person when he was a shameless supporter of the brutal (her word) Indian caste system.

The internationally respected British newspaper, The Guardian (for me a better paper than the New York Times which is rated as the best) gave Roy’s statement, prominent space with the following words; “Gandhi’s views on caste have been a long running argument among historians.”

What is the relevance of Gandhi to an article on Chris Gayle? It is that Gandhi who symbolizes all that is good about the non-white races may not be what we think of him, meaning that maybe non-white civilization may have its evolution defects – see my articles – “Are white people superior to non-whites? Is it in the genes?” March 10, 2013 and “A new book argues for genetic superiority of some races.” May 25, 2014.

By now most analysts would not be surprised that except for a lone voice from an Antiguan women group, the entire Caribbean society has ignored Gayle’s egregious indiscretion. But the Naipaulian creatures that inhabit Caribbean society would have been quick to jump on a white world leader if he had said that to a non-white journalist.

Then you would have seen the mental corrugations inside the colonial mind. “You white elitist, you still think you are in charge of non-white people.” “He is a racist, sexist pig; he must resign.” “All white people think like this; they will never see us as equal to them.”

But Arundhati Roy thinks that Gandhi didn’t see people as equal. Chris Gayle thinks women are the object of men’s sexual curiosity. And non-white people themselves think that they are inferior to the white man.

 

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